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Updated: June 1, 2025
Not to interrupt them she remained on the steps without raising her head any higher. While waiting thus she saw or fancied she saw, for she had a terror of feeling certain her stepfather slowly raise his hand to a level behind Farfrae's shoulders, a curious expression taking possession of his face.
The having nothing to do made him more dreary than any other circumstance; and one day, with better views of Farfrae than he had held for some time, and a sense that honest work was not a thing to be ashamed of, he stoically went down to Farfrae's yard and asked to be taken on as a journeyman hay-trusser. He was engaged at once.
It was in the town-hall, after a council meeting, that he first became aware of Farfrae's coup for establishing himself independently in the town; and his voice might have been heard as far as the town-pump expressing his feelings to his fellow councilmen.
Henchard could almost feel this view of things in course of passage through Farfrae's mind. "I have to go to Mellstock," said Farfrae coldly, as he loosened his reins to move on. "But," implored Henchard, "the matter is more serious than your business at Mellstock. It is your wife! She is ill. I can tell you particulars as we go along."
Sneering at himself for his weakness he yet every hour nay, every few minutes conjectured her actions for the time being her sitting down and rising up, her goings and comings, till thought of Newson's and Farfrae's counter-influence would pass like a cold blast over a pool, and efface her image. And then he would say to himself, "O you fool! All this about a daughter who is no daughter of thine!"
He stood behind Farfrae's chair, watching his dexterity in clearing up the numerical fogs which had been allowed to grow so thick in Henchard's books as almost to baffle even the Scotchman's perspicacity. The corn-factor's mien was half admiring, and yet it was not without a dash of pity for the tastes of any one who could care to give his mind to such finnikin details.
It had given her servants, house, and fine clothing a setting that invested Lucetta with a startling novelty in the eyes of him who had known her in her narrow days. He accordingly lapsed into moodiness, and at every allusion to the possibility of Farfrae's near election to the municipal chair his former hatred of the Scotchman returned. Concurrently with this he underwent a moral change.
He looked towards Donald, who had come near. "Mr. Farfrae's time as my manager is drawing to a close isn't it, Farfrae?" The young man, who could now read the lines and folds of Henchard's strongly-traced face as if they were clear verbal inscriptions, quietly assented; and when people deplored the fact, and asked why it was, he simply replied that Mr. Henchard no longer required his help.
"He will go far he's bent upon getting out of sight and sound!" She walked beside her lover, and when they reached the Crossways, or Bow, turned with him into Corn Street instead of going straight on to her own door. At Farfrae's house they stopped and went in. Farfrae flung open the door of the ground-floor sitting-room, saying, "There he is waiting for you," and Elizabeth entered.
The farmer said he would give the young man half-an-hour for his answer, and went away, leaving the group sorrowing. Lucetta's eyes, full of tears, met Farfrae's. His, too, to her surprise, were moist at the scene. "It is very hard," she said with strong feelings. "Lovers ought not to be parted like that! O, if I had my wish, I'd let people live and love at their pleasure!"
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